The present invention relates generally to collar-mounted electronic “bark limiter” or dog bark training devices, and more particularly to improvements therein which allow improved, more reliable sensing of vibration due to barking of the dog. The invention also relates to improved determination of what constitutes valid barking.
A variety of electronic dog training collars have been utilized for applying electrical shock and/or audible stimulus to a dog when it barks. In many situations it is highly desirable to prevent individual dogs or groups of dogs from barking excessively. For example, one dog's barking in a kennel is likely to stimulate other dogs to bark. This is undesirable with respect to the welfare of the dogs themselves and nearby people. Similar problems occur in neighborhoods in which there are dogs that are kept outside at night: if one dog starts barking others are likely to join in, causing a general disturbance.
The closest prior art is believed to include the present assignee's Bark Limiter product and commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 4,947,795 by G. Farkas entitled “Barking Control Device and Method”, issued Aug. 14, 1990 and incorporated herein by reference.
The Tri-Tronics collar-mounted Bark Limiter product has been successfully marketed by the present assignee for many years. It has been very successful in the market because it effectively controls unwanted barking of large and medium-sized dogs. Its large size has allowed use of large batteries to power the circuitry that allows the Bark Limiter product to produce a substantial level of stimulation, which has been a major reason for the product's success. However, the large size and weight of the assignee's Bark Limiter product have limited it to use on medium-sized and large-sized dogs. Competitive products that have been smaller in size and weight and therefore have been usable on a small or tiny dogs have been introduced to the market, but their small size evidently has necessitated a substantial reduction in the level of stimulation that such products can produce in response to the dog's barking.
Above mentioned U.S. Pat. No. 4,947,795 discloses a bark training device which allows a dog to control the level of electrical stimulus in response to its own barking behavior. This patent discloses circuitry in a collar-mounted electrical device that detects the onset of barking and initially produces only a single low level electrical stimulus pulse that gets the dog's attention, but does not initially produce a highly unpleasant level of stimulation. If the dog continues barking, the stimulation levels of the electrical shock pulses are increased at the onset of each barking episode in a stepwise fashion until the stimulus becomes so unpleasant that the dog stops barking for at least a predetermined time, e.g., one minute. After that minute elapses, the circuitry resets itself to its lowest initial stimultion level and remains inactive until barking begins again, and then repeats the process, beginning with the lowest level of stimulation and increasing the stimulus level if barking continues.
Users of collar-mounted bark training products generally wish to be able to test such products by demonstrating their operability in response to a suitable sound or simulated bark signal. The assignee's prior Bark Limiter product has utilized test lights and an external tester that actuates a barking sound vibration sensor of the Bark Limiter. Some of the prior art bark limiters have vibration sensors such as electret condenser microphones built into their housings between the stimulus electrodes. External buzzers have been used to stimulate the vibration sensor in order to test it and determine if the bark limiter is operative.
A shortcoming of the prior art bark training products is that they detect nearly any sound the dog makes and automatically shock the dog in response to the detected sound. The battery life of some prior bark limiters has been undesirably short because dog owners often find it convenient to leave the devices in a “power on” condition for long periods of time, even during times when the dog is not likely to be barking.
There is an unmet need for an improved sound vibration sensing device for an animal control device mounted on an animal.
There is an unmet need for a bark control device that discriminates between various sounds and vibrations that a dog might make and avoids applying electrical stimulus to the dog in response to any sound other than a valid bark sound.
There also is an unmet need for a small, lightweight, highly effective bark control device that is small and light enough to be readily worn by a small or tiny dog.
There also is an unmet need for an improved bark control device that provides a convenient and effective self-test capability.
There also is an unmet need for an improved bark control device that avoids problems caused by the reliability of prior external vibration sensors and breakage of wire connections thereto.